11.11am: Good morning. Here's a late-morning summary of development's across the region.

Syria

•Forces loyal to the Assad regime have entered the residential Bab Amr distric of Homs overnight, according to Reuters. The neighbourhood, which has played host to regular demonstrations against the regime and to defectors from the army, has borne the brunt of the regime's continued crackdown in recent days. Activists have this morning raised the death toll from yesterday's clashes in Homs to 16, and to 23 nationwide.

•The Arab League is to meet for an emergency session in order to address the Assad regime's continued crackdown on protesters. The body, which last week issued a roadmap to peace to which Damascus agreed, said the meeting would deal with the "continuing violence and the government's failure to stick to its obligations under the Arab Action Plan". It is unclear what action the League could take, writes Julian Borger in today's Guardian, given the intransigence of certain parts of the international community.

Yemen

•Security forces have killed six militants and wounded many others in fighting in the country's restive south, raising to 11 the number of Islamists killed in the area in two days, news agencies report. The clashes, which took place early this morning in the city of Zinjibar, the capital of the southern province of Abyan, were between security forces and al-Qaida-linked militants, according to an official. Observers say they are an illustration of the collapse in security which has occured since the uprising against President Saleh.

Libya

•The UN's top envoy in Libya has warned that some weapons depots are still not secured, and that "much has already gone missing" from certain unguarded sites. In an interview with the Associated Press, Ian Martin said securing the weapons should be a priority for the country's new authorities, saying they represented a "very, very serious cause for concern."

•Libya's new prime minister has also warned of the problem, declaring in a televised speech for Eid al-Adha that "the presence of weapons in this random manner really concerns us." Abdul Rahim al-Keeb said that national reconciliation was a priority for the country. In an interview with The Australian, he warned his biggest challenge would be coping with the pyschological scars of the boys and men who are traumatised from the fighting.

Iran

•The IAEA believes Iran has mastered the critical steps needed to build a nuclear weapon, according to the Washington Post.The government has received assistance from foreign scientists to overcome key technical hurdles, it reported yesterday, in particular a former Soviet weapons scientist who allegedly tutored Iranians over several years on building high-precision detonators of the kind used to trigger a nuclear chain reaction. The speculation came ahead of the release of the IAEA's latest report on Iran, expected on Wednesday.

11.23am: Reuters has more on the reported arrival of troops and militiamen loyal to the Syrian regime in the Bab Arm district of Homs. Activists have said that the army defectors who had helped to defend the neighbourhood had moved out, and the Assad loyalist forces moved in. Raed Ahmad, one of the activists, said:

They are storming houses now and arresting people, but not many are left in Bab Amr. The shabiha [pro-Assad militia] have brought pick-up trucks and are looting buildings.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights has said that security forces have already killed one person in the Deir Baalba district of Homs today.

For the fifth consecutive day, the Syrian regime is imposing a brutal siege on the brave city of Homs, aiming to break the will of its residents who have dared to reject the regime's authority.

The group said the latest siege was preventing medical supplies and food from getting into Homs and preventing families from moving to safer areas. Hozan Ibrahim, a spokesman, said the residents of Bab Amr were being "terrorized with all forms of weaponry."

11.44am: Last night appears to have been a night of vigorous and defiant protest in towns across Syria. The Local Coordinating Committees (LCC) have posted several videos of nocturnal protests.

This one is apparently shot in the Joret Shayah district of Homs.

And the activists say this footage comes from Maret Noman in the northern Idlib province. Neither could be independently verified.

Syria will have a new judicial, legislative, and executive system which will be held accountable by the people. The power of government will be limited, and the people will choose who governs them through the ballot box. Syrians will enjoy the rule of law, where everyone is equal before an independent judiciary, and all Syrians have equal rights to form organizations, political parties, associations, and participate in decision-making.

But who is Ghalioun, asks Al-Arabiya. And can he really become the "father figure" of Syria's uprising?

1.08pm: AP has more from the Bab Amr district of Homs, where troops loyal to President Bashar al-Assad have launched an effort to regain control of the neighbourhood.

It was not immediately clear if government troops had regained control of the Baba Amr district, where the government is reportedly facing armed resistance from defectors who have taken refuge in the neighbourhood and in surrounding districts.

1.52pm: Hozan Ibrahim, the spokesman for the LCC, has been telling me what he understands to be the latest from Bab Amr in Homs. He stressed that it was very difficult to know what exactly is happening due to the lack of communications.

It is catastrophic. People need protection, need food and medical supplies...They are completely cut off. So we just get some reports. The field hospitals are filled with wounded people from gunfire. They lack supplies, don't have blood. And of course the whole neighbourhood has no food supplies so they are starving now, or they will be starving.

Ibrahim said that security forces entered the neighbourhood at around 10pm last night. The defected soldiers who had been defending Bab Amr from bombardment have now retreated, he said, for fear they would attract the regime troops to civilian areas.

Ibrahim said he was unsure how many people had been killed so far today, saying he had heard of "three or four" deaths.

<
Graphic
p>
2.04pm: Here's a lunchtime summary:

Syria

•After five days of tank bombardment, security forces have entered the Bab Amr area of Homs, kicking in doors, storming houses and making arrests. Activists said they believed several more people had died in the city today, including an eight-year-old girl, bringing the total death toll for the week to over a hundred. This could not be independently verified. Demonstrations are being held today across Syria in solidarity of those in Homs.

• The opposition has called on the international community to act to stop what it calls a "humanitarian disaster". The Local Coordinations Committee (LCC) said that "indiscriminate slaughter" was being committed by the regime's militias across the city. It urged the international community to condemn the violence and to provide medical supplies and aid. An LCC spokesman told the Guardian the situation was "catastrophic" (see 1.52pm.)

•The Arab League is to meet for an emergency session in order to address the Assad regime's continued crackdown. The body said the meeting would deal with the "continuing violence and the government's failure to stick to its obligations under the Arab Action Plan".

Yemen

•Security forces have killed six militants and wounded many others in fighting in the country's restive south, raising to 11 the number of Islamists killed in the area in two days, news agencies report. The clashes, which took place early this morning in the city of Zinjibar, the capital of the southern province of Abyan, were between security forces and al-Qaida-linked militants, according to an official. Observers say they are an illustration of the collapse in security which has occured since the uprising against President Saleh.

p>
2.29pm: Demonstrations have been held in towns and cities across Syria today in solidarity with the inhabitants of Homs. Here's one from Kafromah in the northern Idlib province.

3.25pm: European foreign ministers are set to discuss freezing assets belonging to the Yemeni president, Ali Abdullah Saleh, as a means of making him stand down, the French foreign minister has said.

Speaking in Paris after a meeting with Nobel peace laureate Tawakul Karman, Alain Juppé said the discussion would take place "as soon as possible", probably at next week's meeting in Brussels. Reuters reported Karman as telling reporters:

We need more action. We want you to freeze the assets of Saleh and his people and that action is taken at the International Criminal Court as he is a war criminal

The comments came as Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi, Yemen's vice-president mandated by Saleh to negotiate a power transfer deal under a Gulf-brokered plan, returned to the country after undergoing "routine checks" at a US hospital. Reuters writes:

Reports in opposition media said Hadi may have visited the United States to assuage pressure on Saleh to sign the Gulf power transfer plan which would see him stand down and trigger early presidential elections.

U.N. envoy Jamal Benomar, who visited Yemen in September in an unsuccessful bid to devise an operational mechanism for the Gulf initiative, is expected to return to Yemen on Thursday, an official at a U.N. office in Sanaa said.

4.06pm: Muslims all over the world have been celebrating Eid al-Adha, and Arab journalist Dima Khatib summed up the feelings of many when she tweeted on Saturday:

>First Eid Adha in decades without Ben Ali, Mubarak, Gaddafi..

For Tunisians, however, this was not quite true. The country that ushered in the Arab Spring by ushering out its dictator in the Jasmine Revolution was given an unwelcome reminder of Zine el Abidine Ben Ali at the end of a series of holy chants broadcast on state television.

The Tunisian television authority (ETT) has said it is to bring the person responsible for the error before a disciplinary panel. AFP quotes a member of the ETT as saying that, "for the moment, we do not know if the broadcast of the prayer was intentional or not."

The unfortunate prayer provoked incredulity from many viewers. "When will Tunisia be definitively free of all sympathisers of the old regime?" asked one critic on Facebook.

4.47pm: This video, apparently shot in Bab Amr yesterday, gives a good idea of the kind of resistance which had recently been operating from the district.

T

hese men tell the camera they are members of the Free Syrian Army come to protect the neighbourhood from the regime, according to my colleague Mona Mahmood. The first man in uniform to speak declares that they have come to protect the protesters, and that they will "chase and destroy" regime loyalists. The second man to speak calls on the Arab League to take decisive action against the Assad regime. The video's authenticity could not be independently vouched for.

The Homs district had been playing host to a number of army defectors. They are believed to have been defending the neighbourhood against bombardment by security forces. After those forces entered Bab Amr last night, however, many of them are understood to have left.

A spokesman for the LCC said their withdrawal was because they did not want to risk civilians being caught up in the security forces' hunt for them.

5.10pm: The Arab League has received a letter from Damascus asking for its support in the face of supposed American involvement in "bloody events", the organisation has said in a statement.

The statement said the letter from Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Muallem accused Washington "of actual involvement in bloody events in Syria" and asked the League to "condemn the involvement and to do what is necessary to end it," according to AFP.

The statement did not elaborate on the accusations of US involvement in the Syrian bloodshed.

In the letter, Syria, which is under growing pressure to implement an Arab plan to end violence against protesters, sought Arab assistance "to provide the appropriate atmosphere to implement the agreement," said the statement.

5.18pm: There is some very disturbing footage apparently coming out of Homs today. One video- warning: extremely graphic- shows the body of a young girl lying on a carpet in a pink top.

She appears to have very serious head wounds. In the background men are heard shouting and women crying.

The girl's name, says the man speaking on the footage, is Maymouna al-Sayed. He says she was martyred- or killed- today in the Houla district of Homs during heavy sniper fire.

"Are these your reforms, Bashar?" asks a man repeatedly, referring to the commitment to change the Syrian president supposedly made last week with the Arab League.

Thanks to my colleague Mona Mahmood for the translation. We cannot verify the video's authenticity. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported the death of an eight-year-old girl in Houla today, but has not yet said whether this was Maymouna.

<

Graphic
span class="timestamp">5.48pm: Time for an evening summary.

Syria

•Security forces loyal to the Assad regime have raided the Bab Amr area of Homs, arresting people and storming houses in the latest stage of their efforts to stifle dissent.Regime troops entered the district last night and remained there today, continuing a crackdown that has seen Homs become a besieged city according to activists. They reported several more deaths, bringing the death toll for the past week in Homs to over a hundred. This could not be independently verified.

•One of the victims was an eight-year-old girl caught in gunfire in the Houla district of Homs, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. On the internet an extremely graphic video circulated of a young girl with apparently fatal head wounds. It was not known whether they were the same girl.

•The Syrian opposition called for international action to stop the "humanitarian disaster" taking place in Homs. The Local Coordinations Committee (LCC) said "indiscriminate slaughter" was being committed by the regime's militias across the city. It also said that inhabitants of the besieged city were suffering from a lack of medicines, food and water. An LCC spokesman told the Guardian the situation was "catastrophic" (see 1.52pm.)

•Demonstrations were held in towns and cities across Syria in support with those in Homs. In Damascus, Aleppo, Hama and Kafromah- among other places- Syrians chanted anti-Assad slogans and waved banners.

•Syria has asked the Arab League for its support in the face of alleged US involvement in the country's "bloody events". In a letter, foreign minister Walid Muallem asked the body to condemn the role. The move comes four days before the League is due to meet to discuss Damascus's failure to keep to the agreement announced last week. (See 5.10pm.)

Yemen

•European foreign ministers will next week discuss freezing the assets of Yemeni president Ali Abdullah Saleh, the French foreign minister said. Speaking after a meeting with Nobel peace laureate Tawakul Karman, Alain Juppé said the discussion would take place "as soon as possible", probably at next week's meeting in Brussels. (See 3.25pm.)

•Security forces killed six militants and wounded many others in fighting in the country's restive south, raising to 11 the number of Islamists killed in the area in two days, news agencies reported. The clashes, which took place early this morning in the city of Zinjibar, the capital of the southern province of Abyan, were between security forces and al-Qaida-linked militants, according to an official.

Iran

•Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad lashed out at the United States and Israel, accusing them of seeking world support for an attack on his country.He told an Egyptian newspaper: "Iran's [nuclear] capabilities are increasing and it is progressing, and for that reason it has been able to compete in the world. Now Israel and the West, particularly America, fear Iran's capabilities and role."